The Toilet Brush Dilemma
by ct2191
Summary: A patient with an unusual injury causes more than just a pain the the rear for him.
1. Chapter 1

Sam had quickly learned that a day in the ED was no less hectic than her days out in Afghanistan, in fact there were very few differences between the two. Endlessly barking out commands to nearby assistance, shocking people back to life with defibrillators, stitching up wounds and carrying out chest drains are just a few of the many examples. One thing, however, you never see in a battlefield with machinegun fire constantly whizzing over your head is a man with a toilet brush shoved up a particularly uncomfortable place that it would probably be best not to mention.

Sam and Tom had been enjoying their break in the most creative way they could think of by doing something, again, that shouldn't be mentioned for the sake of keeping this story clean but the phrase 'On call room' should give you the right idea. Unfortunately for them a few minutes into this _endeavour _there was a harsh knock at the door and the sounds of Tess bellowing commands from the other side of it completely broke the mood.

Following a hasty retrieval of clothes which somehow resulted in Tom trying to put on Sam's bra before he realized it was not his vest and Sam walking out with Tom's shoes on they were finally ready to listen to Tess, albeit with Tom looking like a drunken flamingo has he struggled to pull one of Sam's trainers, which just so happened to be neon pink, over his heel.

"There's a patient I think you're both going to want to see in cubicle four." Tess barked, choosing to ignore Tom's attempts to pull the tiny item of footwear onto his elephant sized appendage.

Unfortunately for him, however, Big Mac and Noel did not have the same tact and started hooting and laughing at him, though this didn't match the high pitched cackle that was emitted from Louise. Sam, upon noticing that she felt as though she was wearing clown shoes hastily switched with Tom as her face turned a colour close to the nice shade of beetroot Tom's had gone.

As Tess led them over to the cubicle they were forced to take the walk of shame, enduring the wolf whistles and hollers without batting an eyelash for engaging them would definitely make the torment worse.

"Hey Noel! If you ever find a girlfriend who's into a comic loving teenager in an adult body THEN you can start laughing at me for having a girlfriend with the same brain age as me!"

Apparently Tom missed the memo.

Tess silenced Noel's most likely witty retort with a look that would have scared off a T-Rex before pulling back the curtain with a single swish and revealing an empty cubicle.

"Tess what-" Sam began, dumbfounded.

"Shhh! Look, this next case is a very… _sensitive_ one and I am relying on the digression of you both. Do you understand?" Tess said in a hushed tone, "And under no circumstances will you laugh."

Tom and Sam nodded simultaneously, serious expressions forming on their faces which were now returning to a normal colour. This, however, proved hard to maintain.

The curtains moved back further to reveal a man laying face down on a trolley with what looked like a pyramid on top of his rear end with a sheet over it being pulled by Bic Mac and what Sam could only hazard a guess to be a woman wearing a hoodie and a balaclava over her mouth.

"Right sir, 'ere we are then," Bic Mac said in his usual cheery tones, "We'll have that out of you in a jiffy so long as Dr Kent and Dr Nichols here don't feel an urgent desire to use the on call room for something other than sleeping."

Big Mac shuffled off after giving them both a knowing wink. Tess sighed and rolled her eyes before turning to the matter at hand and whipping a curtain around the cubicle.

"How are his vitals?" Tess asked the mysterious woman.

"Fine. He was stable all the way here." The woman replied in a voice and accent that sounded mysteriously familiar.

"Right then sir, let's get started." Tess said briskly, pulling back the sheet.

Tom and Sam nearly exploded with laughter then and there, for the man appeared to have the handle end of a toilet brush shoved in somewhere no toilet brush, especially one that appeared to have the contents of the toilet still on the bristles, was ever supposed to go. After a few disapproving looks from Tess Sam finally calmed down enough to ask,

"How did this happen?"

"I ACCIDENTLY bumped into her in the bathroom with my behind and next thing I know she's given me a bloody tail!" The man exclaimed, turning to face them both.

"Sorry sir!" Tom said, the smile wiping off of his face immediately, "I didn't know you were awake!"

"It's fine… If it didn't 'urt so bloody much I'd probably be laughin' right along with ya, that and if that old bitch hadn't given me one painful ass." The man replied, wincing as Sam examined him.

"You scared the hell out of me! And less of the old." The woman exclaimed in a voice that was now so disturbingly familiar if Tess hasn't told her digression was the objective Sam would have yelled out her name in the hope that the real version of the person she thought that was would come into the now very cramped cubicle and dispel her theory.

"Scared you? All I did was bump into you in that tiny bathroom of yours while you cleaned the damn toilet!" The man shouted over his shoulder, moving to try and see her before asking, "And why are you dressed up like you're about to raid a bloody bank?"

"Sir I need you to remain still while I complete this exam." Tom said calmly as the man squirmed around to stare at his attacker.

"How I am dressed is of no concern to you." The woman snapped.

"You're damn right it's not. I liked it a lot better when you weren't wearing any clothes." The man replied with a cheeky grin.

Sam, who had been trying not to laugh at the disgusted expression on Tom's face after he got a look at what was on the bristles of the toilet brush which was mere inches from his face, noticed that the woman looked like she was about to grab a catheter and shove that somewhere else very painful and upon deciding that it was probably a good idea to dispel this action asked,

"Do you have any health problems?" Sam asked before the woman could respond.

"Not until last night. I'm never eating bar food again." The man moaned, wincing slightly as Tom continued his examination.

"Can you tell me what happened?" Tess asked as she filled out a chart.

"We met in a bar last night and ate something... I can't remember exactly what because we were drunk... Anyway she invited me back to her place and-well you can guess what we were getting up to... But about half way through we both started, er, needing the toilet. A lot. By the morning it had worn off but her tiny bathroom was in a bit of a state and while I was using some mouthwash she was bending down and cleaning the loo... I bumped into her and she um… reacted." The man explained, going slightly red.

"I'm going to assume you weren't wearing any clothes." Tom said as he finished his exam.

"Well I would have a bit of a problem getting them off with that thing shoved up my-"

"Ma'am if you're ill then we need to take a look at you too." Tom said hastily, cutting across the end of a sentence he had no desire to hear.

"That won't be necessary." The woman barked, jerking away as he moved towards her.

"Tom that's not a-" Tess began, but unfortunately before she could finish that particular sentence the damage had been done.

Tom had attempted to remove the balaclava and came face to face with none other than Zoe Hanna. Upon seeing her face Sam found herself unable to hold in the laugh any longer and was soon on the floor in stitches and the noise of Sam's hysterical laughter then set of a chain reaction which rippled around the ED in a matter of seconds.

The curtains to the cubicle were soon whipped back by Fletch, who stared at the man's exposed rear with the sewage-ridden toilet brush stuck up it for a full second before diverting his gaze to Zoe's mortified face and bursting out laughing.

This in turn alerted Noel, Louise and Big Mac at reception who took one look and also fell about laughing, which attracted pretty much every nurse, doctor and conscious patient in the ED. Zoe could only think of one thing to say, or rather screech, and most of it wasn't pleasant. In fact there was only one word of it that was even writeable:

"SAM!"

…

_**My first attempt at a comedy... I hope you liked it! **_


	2. Chapter 2

Seeing the head of the department with such a mortified expression made it exceedingly difficult for even Tess to keep a straight face, and pretty soon she was laughing along with everyone else, though it has to be said that her laugh did sound like a hyena being strangled most likely due to lack of use.

It took a full ten minutes for the laughter to die down, more than enough time for Zoe to dive into the toilets after hastily re applying the balaclava. Unfortunately the sheer embarrassment had apparently affected her eyesight, for she had dove into the men's toilets at a speed that would rival a cheetah, which naturally increased the laughter tenfold.

Sam, who had managed to employ some army style discipline into her stance, was the first one to recover. She managed to use the temporary lack of sanity that appeared to have engulfed the ED to quickly cross the floor over to the toilets, however not without enduring a few remarks from Bic Mac about how the men's toilets will be the next place she and Tom would be locking during their breaks, and gently pushed open the door.

As soon as she entered she heard something that at a first listen sounded like sobbing coming from one of the cubicles. Sam hurried over, gently asking Zoe to unlock it as she did so, and after around a minute of this found herself backing away from a putrid smell.

As it turned out Zoe had not run into the toilets because she was embarrassed, though Sam noted she was definitely still a little pink when she finally opened the door, it was because the apparent bout of food poisoning was not finished with her bowels. What was stranger than this, however, was the fact that the sounds being emitted from Zoe that Sam had assumed to be sobbing were in fact shouts of laughter being muffled by one hand.

"What?" Zoe exclaimed innocently as Sam stared at her like she had gone mad, "It was funny!"

"Even if you're the centre of the joke?" Sam asked, her voice muffled by her hand.

"Well it's not just me who's the butt of the joke!" Zoe said through more laughs.

Sam found herself wishing she was one of those women who carry perfume everywhere they go, for clamping her hands around her mouth and nose was not helping. Upon noticing her disgusted expression Zoe turned and faced her, drawing herself up to her full height, and gave her the sternest expression she could muster, which wasn't very stern at all as it was clear she was still internally laughing.

Sam was preparing herself for yet another ear bashing by squeezing her eyes shut to avoid any of the spit that was no doubt going to fly out of her mouth and holding her breath so she could clamp her hands over her ears, as she knew from bitter experience that Zoe's screaming voice was terribly loud without the aid of a room that no doubt echoed.

After a few seconds if silence Sam warily removed her hands from her ears and tentatively opened her eyes. Zoe had disappeared into another cubicle and the sounds of her farting among other rather disturbing noises made Sam turn tail and burst out of the door as quickly as her athletic legs would allow, saving her nose and ears from further torture.

As she walked over to the cubicle she noted that everyone seemed to be going about their jobs in a somewhat subdued manor, and as she got closer to Tess Sam also noted that Tess appeared rather ticked off once more. After taking a moment to fill in the blanks Sam assumed Tess had given everyone a piece of her mind, in spite of the fact she was making herself a hypocrite.

"Where's Zoe?" Tom asked as he injected some morphine into a drip they had managed to get in the man's hand.

"She's... Going to be a while." Sam said, choosing her words carefully as she was fully aware of the fact that Zoe would most likely berate her for telling them all of her food poisoning woes.

"Is she crying?" The toilet brush man asked in what Sam read a hopeful tone.

"No…" She said slowly as the corners of her mouth began to twitch.

Sam stepped closer to Tom and found that her boyfriend recoiled away from her, holding his nose with a gloved hand.

"You smell like a sewer!" He exclaimed before adding, "…ah. I think I know what's happened to Zoe."

"What?" The man asked.

"Well... let me put it this way. I don't think the illness you two had went away overnight." Tom said slowly after removing his hand form his nose.

"Oh god.." The man said suddenly, "I think you're right!"

What unfolded over the next few seconds would definitely make it into the Holby ED comedy books, as just as Fletch pulled back the curtain with a bag of saline solution and a tray with a small needle in it…. Well for the sake of still keeping this clean (as clean as you can get with toilets, diarrhoea and general smelliness) lets just say that exploding diarrhoea and Fletch's scrubs were not a very good combination for him at the very least.

The force of the _explosion_ caused the second chain reaction of the day, for Fletch fell backwards more out of shock than out of the force of the 'stuff' that was erupting onto him and in an attempt to soften the landing placed both of his hands on the floor, letting go of both the bag of saline, which promptly popped under him like a water balloon and the tray with a needle in it which ended up point first in his rear.

"Ouch." Was the understated response he managed to give after the ED fell into a dead and awkward silence for good few seconds.

As it turned out the word ouch did not come close to filling in the gravity of pain Fletch should have been feeling with 3 inches of needle in somewhere nobody wants a needle and was also the wrong response entirely.

"What was in that needle fletch?" Tom asked in a worried tone.

"Sedative." Fletch just managed to reply before he laid on the ground in his sewage coated scrubs and quickly fell unconscious.

The next few seconds after Fletch fell unconscious were awkward at best, for no one dared touch the nurse who had been turned into a pile of raw sewage and though the whole ED had had a full view of what had happened they didn't really feel like laughing. That was, until Zoe finally emerged from the loo, as she took one look at the unconscious nurse on the floor and exploded with laughter.

A few seconds after Zoe stepped out of the loo, however, everyone close to either her, the toilet brush man of Fletch were running for the exit as the smell reached an unbearable volume.

"Someone call the decontamination unit for god's sake!" Was Tom yelled when they made it outside.

…


	3. Chapter 3

Apparently one of the nurses had heard Tom holler something about needing the decontamination squad and thought that he was serious. So, now, as he and Sam struggled into some protective clothing that Sam had moodily described as 'space suits that were made for elephants', mostly because the squad did not have anything their size, they prepared to head back into the ED which most likely smelled worse than a sewer.

This course of action of course followed a long supposed-to-be-hot-but-was-really-freezing shower with a shower gel that smelled like disinfectant. No one was really sure what was going on with the three people left in the building, as the decontamination squad had set up their operation outside and refused to let anyone until they were safely inside their 'spacesuits'.

"Sam." Tom said suddenly, grabbing her shoulder and making her suit crackle like a plastic bag.

"What's up?" She asked with concern.

"If this…Illness…is contagious and you get it I want to promise you one thing." Tom said with something that sounded like genuine sincerity.

"Tom... You don't have to promise to look after me..." Sam said with a smile, expecting him to promise anyway.

"Are you kidding?! I promise to throw you into an isolation unit the first chance I get! I'm not going near anymore exploding arses!"

"Thanks Tom." Sam sad sarcastically before adding, "Luckily for you it's food poisoning."

The ED team entered slowly, casting their gazes about warily for any signs of exploding rear ends pointing their way so they could dive out of the building once more. Luckily for them, no one was around. The filters in the spacesuit headgear did nothing to get rid of the smell, however, and Zoe, Fletch, now without a covering of filth, and the former toilet brush man were all in beds and opposite ends of the ED.

The former toilet brush man's toilet brush had obviously been forced out of his rear by the power of the last explosion, and fletch had been cleaned up by the decontamination squad but was still unconscious. Zoe was the strangest case of all. She was sitting up in her bed giggling like a four year old while throwing bed pans at one of the members of the decontamination squad.

"She's had some kind of... Reaction to the pain relief." One of the other decontamination squad members explained.

Tom and Sam hurried over, concerned for their friend and boss. That concern quickly evaporated however as they both found bedpans launched at their faces.

"Well get them off of her then!" Tom exclaimed, reaching forwards and snatching the pile of a hundred or so before Zoe could grab another.

"NO!" Zoe screeched, jumping off of the bed and lurching forwards, digging her fake nails into his space-suited arm until he dropped them back on her bed.

"Ow!" Tom exclaimed, examining the small cut as Zoe quickly gathered them all up and threw another at Sam.

"Zoe what the hell?!" Sam shouted, attempting to grab the bedpans also and ending with a hole and a cut herself.

"Fun!" Zoe replied, throwing a few of the bedpans in the air as though they were confetti and getting hit on the head before yelling something that sounded like, "Oooowwwwwuuucch!"

"Please don't tell me this damn illness has turned her into a kid. I do NOT want to end up like that." Said the former toilet brush guy from across the room, who was now sitting up and staring at Zoe like she was insane.

"Relax. You're girlfriend is absolutely fine." Tom called back, "She's just having a reaction to the medication we've given her.

"She's not my-" Began toilet brush guy angrily.

"Boyfriend?!" Zoe exclaimed excitedly, "PRINCE CHARMING!"

Before anyone could stop her Zoe quickly got up off of her bed, bedpans apparently forgotten, and ran over her would be one night stand and clambered onto his bed grabbing him around the middle and hugging him. The man's face was a mixture of shock, disgust (she didn't exactly smell wonderful would be the polite way to put the reason why) and repulsion while he squirmed in her grasp.

"Gerrof me!" He yelled as she closed her eyes and rested her head on his chest.

"Er… Zoe?" Sam called uncertainly.

"Yes Sammy-antha?" Zoe mumbled, making Tom snort with laughter and Sam frown.

"He's not prince charming. In fact he's a long way away from being charming, let alone a prince." Sam said, ignoring Tom.

"OI!" The man yelped in reply.

"Not a prince?" Zoe said and to Sam's surprise she actually looked upset.

"No. Not a prince." Sam confirmed.

The next few seconds involved Zoe hastily letting go of the man and running away at full pelt, straight into the men's toilets once more which unfortunately had not been cleaned. She then proceeded to make a sound which was a cross between a lion roaring and someone shouting 'EEEEEEEEEEEEEWWW' incredibly loudly before running full pelt out of the door and back onto her bed, aiming a bedpan at the former toilet brush man and hitting him squarely in the temple.

"YOU-" He yelled attempting to leap off of his bed but finding Tom placing a restraining hand on his shoulder.

"Not a good idea." He said simply, before a noise behind him made him turn around.

"Ugh…" Fletch mumbled as Sam hurried over to him.

"How do you feel?" She asked while taking his pulse.

"Like I just got knocked out by anaesthetic sniping me in the arse following a bath of... something not very nice." He replied with his eyes closed.

Suddenly his eyes flew open and he stared at Sam with a look of fear.

"Um… Sam…" He began.

"Are you ok?" She asked in a worried tone.

"I don't think what those two had was food poisoning." Fletch replied.

"Why's that?" She asked with a frown, "The symptoms indicated…"

"Because food poisoning is not contagious." Fletch replied before diving towards the men's toilets.

Sam and Tom watched as he dove straight out of then again and into the women's holding his nose before turning to face one and other. Their gaze then somewhat comically turned to the cuts on their arms caused by Zoe's nails and back to each other once again.

"Oh. Great." Was all Tom managed to say before both he and Sam ran full pelt towards the toilets themselves.

…

_**I'll update again next weekend! :)**_


	4. Chapter 4

Pretty soon the entirety of the ED found themselves on and endless rota in and out of hospital beds and toilets, wishing they had gas masks opposed to crinkly suits. Sam and Tom, though among the first of the doctors who were not patients to come down with the illness, found themselves to be one of the last to finish needing the toilet every five minutes.

"Ugh…" Was all Tom could say when the ordeal was over.

Zoe's allergic reaction to the medication she was on was apparently not confined to her, for though she was now sober and moody as hell there were several other nurses, including Tess, now reaping the benefits of a stack of bedpans all of their own. Fletch, on the other hand was apparently not allergic to the medication but did not get off easily as he was now the main target for all the bed pan throwers.

The decontamination squad had quarantined the entire ED, refusing to allow any new admissions and were scrubbing the place from head to foot while attempting to treat the toddlers formerly known as nurses. In a way Sam and Tom felt sorry for them, as they were forced to endure several bedpans to the head themselves, but being forced to remain in a place that smelled like a sewer and in a suit that made you sweat like there was no tomorrow was very quickly turning their sympathy into a twisted pleasure every time a bedpan met it's mark.

"Goal!" Sam exclaimed as a particularly hard throw of Tess's made one of the men in space suits stagger.

"Are you sure you're not allergic to these meds?" Zoe asked moodily after hearing her triumphant yell.

"Yes, but I think I'm allergic to being in hospital for too long."

"You work on one." Was Tom's slightly haphazard reply.

"_On _one?" Sam repeated, staring at him with a mixture of worry and amusement.

"Wait.. oops!" Tom exclaimed, letting out a childish giggle.

"_Wonderful…" _Both Zoe and Sam said simultaneously as Tom started looking around for things to throw.

The following few hours were very similar to the last few, except for the fact that the main target of the bedpan throwers, and in one case a metal kidney dish, was Sam. The men in space suits did attempt to move her into a private room but the doctors–and-nurses-turned-children squealed and bawled to the point where every person in the ED, including the sources of the noise, had a mammoth sized headache and so they were forced to move her back.

"Tom!" Sam shouted after a bedpan narrowly missed her eye.

"Hehehe!" Tom said in a way that was not unlike a 'bad guy' from a cartoon.

"This is better than Eastenders." The toilet brush man stated in a way that even the 'children' couldn't miss the sarcasm.

"HAHAHAHAHAH! Sar-castic man!" Was one of the slightly child-like nurse's reply.

"What does sar-cas-tic mean?" Said a doctor turned four year old.

"HAHAHAHAHAHA—WHOOO-HAHAHAHA!" Was Tom's response that in Sam's opinion sounded like a baby watching the teletubbies.

"Someone sedate me!" Sam exclaimed, going as far to hold her arm out as though waiting for an injection.

This turned out to be the wrong response. A few seconds after Sam put her arm down the decontamination squad came back in with a gas sedative, and began attempting to place the 'gas masks' over the patients affected by the reaction's faces. This proved a struggle, and Sam was sure many of them would have large bruises from the bedpan beating their heads were taking, but still they persisted.

After finally securing the masks around several of their faces they noticed something peculiar. The supposed knock out gas was not doing its job, but was rather turning the ED into an episode of 'Alvin and the chipmunks'. Sam assumed that the gas was instead helium, for now the patient affected by the medication, including Tom, sounded incredibly squeaky.

Unfortunately for Sam she, again, provided to be the wrong response. After once glance at Tom's bright red face as he hiccupped and snorted through bouts of squeaky laughter had her in hysterics also. Unfortunately the space suits the decontamination squad were wearing must have been making them hard of hearing, for as soon as Sam started laughing they rushed over and place a mask over her head also then scratched their plastic covered heads as her laughing grew louder to the point they could hear it.

"Helium?! What the hell!" One of the decontamination squad members exclaimed after chancing opening the visor on his helmet to get a better listen.

As Sam and Tom stared at each other Sam realized something quite important for her at least. She wasn't high on any drug, just on endorphins, and yet she felt just as happy as Tom appeared. As she then turned her gaze to the rest of the ED acknowledged that while something like this would probably never happen again the memory of this day will probably be more than enough to get everyone in fits of laughter, even Zoe who right now looked more happy than Sam had ever seen her, and generally brighten the mood around the ED. The thought of this made her laugh grow louder, although the men in space suits seemed to think she was now

…

A few hours later everyone was pretty much recovered and, with the exception of the toilet brush guy, who had some bruising in a very uncomfortable place, they were all free to go home. Tom and Sam stepped out of the ED first, blinking as the harsh morning sun hit their eyes.

"So…" Tom said awkwardly.

"Yes tubs?"

"_Tubs?" _Tom repeated, turning and staring at her with a frown.

"Not only did you laugh like a four year old watching the teletubbies you actually started bounding around the ED like one with the men in spacesuits chasing you around. I think you've earned the nickname." Sam said with an eyebrow raised.

"Oh. Thanks." Said Tom with more than a hint of relief.

"You sound… happy about that." Sam said in a quizzical manor.

"Well I thought you were calling me fat for a second…" He said with a grin.

"Oh so being called a teletubby is better than being fat," Sam stated, "I'll remember that."

"Dr Nicholls…." Tom said slowly, standing behind her and placing his hands around her waist.

"Yes?" Sam asked innocently.

"Before we were... interrupted… by Tess what were we doing?" He asked casually.

"You know," Sam began, turning to face him with a look of mock forgetfulness and placing a hand on his chest, "I can't remember."

"That's good." He smiled with his hands on her hips.

"It's good I'm forgetful?" Sam asked, tipping her head to one side to turn her look of forgetfulness to confusion.

"In this case yes…" He whispered, leaning close to her ear, "Because I get to spend all night reminding you."

Sam grinned up at him as he closed the gap between then and gave her a kiss, and that should have been where the story ended. However apparently the 24 hours of humour wasn't over as no sooner had their lips connected Sam had pulled back and held her nose.

"Maybe not all night because you're going to spend at least half of it in the shower washing the stink out of you."

"Maybe you could join me…"

"Not a chance."

_End_

…

_**Sorry about the late update… I've been ill for nearly two weeks and I had a chronic case of writer's block the whole time! I should (HOPEFULLY) be able to update Explosions tomorrow so long as I can actually think of a way to start the chapter between now and then! **_


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